Andrew Lobaczewski - Political Ponerology: A Science on the Nature of Evil Adjusted for Political Purposes
distinguished scientific language it would behoove us to foster.
An analogy can be drawn between this conceptual language of
psychology and mathematical symbols. Very often, a single
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51
Greek letter stands for many pages of mathematical operations
which is instantly recognized by the mathematician.
Objective language
In the categories of psychological objectivity, cognition and
thought are based on the same logical and methodological prin-
ciples shown to be the best tool in many other areas of natural-
istic studies. Exceptions to these rules have become a tradition
for ourselves and for creatures similar to us, but they turn out to
engender more error than usefulness. At the same time, how-
ever, consistent adherence to these principles, and rejection of
additional scientific limitations, lead us toward the wide hori-
zon from which it is possible to glimpse supernatural causal-
ity. Accepting the existence of such phenomena within the
human personality becomes a necessity if our language of psy-
chological concepts is to remain an objective structure.
In affirming his own personality, man has the tendency to
repress from the field of his consciousness any associations
indicating an external causative conditioning of his world view
and behavior. Young people in particular want to believe they
freely chose their intentions and decisions; at the same time,
however, an experienced psychological analyst can track the
causative conditions of these choices without much difficulty.
Much of this conditioning is hidden within our childhood; the
memories may be receding into the distance, but we carry the
results of our early experiences around with us throughout our
lives.
The better our understanding of the causality of the human
personality, the stronger the impression that humanity is a part
of nature and society, subject to dependencies we are ever bet-
ter able to understand. Overcome by human nostalgia, we then
wonder if there is really no room for a scope of freedom, for a
Purusha9? The more progress we make in our art of under-
9 Sanskrit. A word literally meaning “man”; but bearing the mystical signifi-
cance of the “Ideal Man”, the Higher Self within. The term Purusha is often
used in the Esoteric philosophy to express the Spirit or the everlasting entita-
tive individual of a Universe, a Solar System, or of a man. Purusha comes
from the verb-root pri – to fill, to make complete, to bestow. One of the two
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SOME INDESPENSIBLE CONCEPTS
standing human causation, the better we are able to liberate the
person who trusts us from the toxic effects of conditioning,
which has unnecessarily constricted his freedom of proper
comprehension and decision making. We are thus in a position
to close ranks with our patient in a search for the best way out
of his problems. If we succumb to the temptation of using the
natural structure of psychological concepts for this purpose, our
advice to him would sound similar to the many non-productive
pronouncements he has already heard and that never quite
manage to really help him to become free of his problem.
The everyday, ordinary, psychological, societal, and moral
world view is a product of man’s developmental process within
a society, under the constant influence of innate traits. Among
these innate traits are mankind’s phylogenetically determined
instinctive foundation, and the upbringing furnished by the
family and the environment. No person can develop without
being influenced by other people and their personalities, or by
the values imbued by his civilization and his moral and relig-
ious traditions. That is why his natural world view of humans
can be neither sufficiently universal nor completely true. Dif-
ferences among individuals and nations are the product of both
inherited dispositions and the ontogenesis10 of personalities.
It is thus significant that the main values of this human
world view of nature indicate basic similarities in spite of great
divergences in time, race, and civilization. This world view
quite obviously derives from the nature of our species and the
natural experience of human societies which have achieved a
certain necessary level of civilization. Refinements based on
literary values or philosophical and moral reflections do show
differences, but, generally speaking, they tend to bring together
the natural conceptual languages of various civilizations and
eras. People with a humanistic education may therefore get the
impression that they have achieved wisdom. We shall also
ultimate realities of Sankhya philosophy. The divine Self, the absolute Real-
ity, pure Consciousness. [Editor’s note.]
10 Ontogeny (also ontogenesis or morphogenesis) describes the origin and the
development of an organism from the fertilized egg to its mature form. On-
togeny is studied in developmental biology. [Editor’s note.]
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53
continue to respect the wisdom of that “common sense” de-
rived from life experience and reflections thereon.
However, a conscientious psychologist must ask the follow-
ing questions: Even if the natural world view has been refined,
does it mirror reality with sufficient reliability? Or does it only
mirror our species’ perception? To what extent can we depend
upon it as a basis for decision making in the individual, societal
and political spheres of life?
Experience teaches us, first of all, that this natural world
view has permanent and characteristic tendencies toward de-
formation dictated by our instinctive and emotional features.
Secondly, our work exposes us to many phenomena which
cannot be understood nor described by natural language alone.
An objective scientific language able to analyze the essence of
a phenomenon thus becomes an indispensable tool. It has also
shown itself to be similarly indispensable for an understanding
of the questions presented within this book.
Now, having laid the groundwork, let us attempt a listing of
the most important reality-deforming tendencies and other
insufficiencies of the natural human world view.
Those emotional features which are a natural component of
the human personality are never completely appropriate to the
reality being experienced. This results both from our instinct
and from our common errors of upbringing. That is why the
best tradition of philosophical and religious thought have coun-
seled subduing the emotions in order to achieve a more accu-
rate view of reality.
The natural world view is also characterized by a similar,
emotional, tendency to endow our opinions with moral judg-
ment, often so negative as to represent outrage. This appeals to
tendencies which are deeply rooted in human nature and socie-
tal customs. We easily extrapolate this method of comprehen-
sion onto manifestations of improper human behavior, which
are, in fact, caused by minor psychological deficiencies. When
another individual behaves in a way that we deem to be “bad”,
we tend to make a judgment of negative intent rather than seek-
ing to understand the psychological conditions that might be
driving them, and convincing them that they are, in fact, behav-
ing very properly. Thus, any moralizing interpretation of minor
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SOME INDESPENSIBLE CONCEPTS
psychopathological phenomena is erroneous and merely leads
to an exceptional number of unfortunate consequences, which
is why we shall repeatedly refer to it.
Another defect of the natural world view is its lack of uni-
versality. In every society, a certain percentage of the people
has developed a world view a good deal different from that
used by the majority. The causes of the aberrations are by no
means qualitatively monolithic; we will be discussing them in
greater detail in the fourth chapter.
Another essential deficiency of the natural world view is its
limited scope of applicability. Euclidean geometry would suf-
fice for a technical reconstruction of our world and for a trip to
the moon and the closest planets. We only need a geometry
whose axioms are less natural if we reach inside of an atom or
outside of our solar system. The average person does not en-
counter phenomena for which Euclidean geometry would be
insufficient. Sometime during his lifetime, virtually every per-
son is faced with problems he must deal with. Since a compre-
hension of the truly operational factors is beyond the ken of his
natural world view, he generally relies on emotion: intuition
and the pursuit of happiness. Whenever we meet a person
whose individual world view developed under the influence of
non-typical conditions, we tend to pass moral judgment upon
him in the name of our more typical world view. In short,
whenever some unidentified psychopathological factor comes
into play, the natural human world view ceases to be applica-
ble.
Moving further, we often meet with sensible people en-
dowed with a well-developed natural world view as regards
psychological, societal, and moral aspects, frequently refined
via literary influences, religious deliberations, and philosophi-
cal reflections. Such persons have a pronounced tendency to
overrate the values of their world view, behaving as though it
were an objective basis for judging other people. They do not
take into account the fact that such a system of apprehending
human matters can also be erroneous, since it is insufficiently
objective. Let us call such an attitude the “egotism of the natu-
ral world view”. To date, it has been the least pernicious type
of egotism, being merely an overestimation of that method of
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55
comprehension containing the eternal values of human experi-
ence.
Today, however, the world is being jeopardized by a phe-
nomenon which cannot be understood nor described by means
of such a natural conceptual language; this kind of egotism thus
becomes a dangerous factor stifling the possibility of objective
counteractive measures. Developing and popularizing the ob-
jective psychological world view could thus significantly ex-
pand the scope of dealing with evil, via sensible action and
pinpointed countermeasures.
The objective psychological language, based on mature phi-
losophical criteria, must meet the requirements derived from its
theoretical foundations, and meet the needs of individual and
macrosocial practice. It should be evaluated fully on the basis
of biological realities and constitute an extension of the analo-
gous conceptual language elaborated by the older naturalistic
sciences, particularly medicine. Its range of applicability
should cover all those facts and phenomena conditioned upon
cognizable biological factors for which this natural language
has proved inadequate. It should, within this framework, allow
sufficient understanding of the contents, and varied causes, for
the genesis of the above-mentioned deviant world views.
Elaborating such a conceptual language, being far beyond
the individual scope of any scientist, is a step-by-step affair; by
means of the contribution of many researchers, it matures to the
point when it could be organized under philosophical supervi-
sion in the light of above-mentioned foundations. Such a task
would greatly contribute to the development of all bio-
humanistic and social sciences by liberating them from the
limitations and erroneous tendencies imposed by the overly
great influence of the natural language of psychological imagi-
nation, especially when combined with an excessive compo-
nent of egotism.
Most of the questions dealt with in this book are beyond the
scope of applicability of the natural language. The fifth chapter
shall deal with a macrosocial phenomenon which has rendered
our traditional scientific language completely deceptive. Un-
derstanding these phenomena thus requires consistent separa-
tion from the habits of that method of thinking and the use of
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SOME INDESPENSIBLE CONCEPTS
the most objective system of concepts possible. For this pur-
pose, it proves necessary to develop the contents, organize
them, and familiarize the readers with them as well.
At the same time, an examination of the phenomena whose
nature forced the use of such a system will render a great con-
tribution to enriching and perfecting the objective system of
concepts.
While working on these matters, the author gradually accus-
tomed himself to comprehending reality by means of this very
method, a way of thinking which turned out to be both the most
appropriate and the most economical in terms of time and ef-
fort. It also protects the mind from its own natural egotism and
any excessive emotionalism.
In the course of the above-mentioned inquiries, each re-
searcher went through his own period of crisis and frustration
when it became evident that the concepts he had trusted thus
far proved to be inapplicable. Ostensibly, correct hypotheses
formulated in the scientifically improved natural conceptual
language turned out to be completely unfounded in the light of
facts, and of preliminary statistical calculations. At the same
time, the elaboration of concepts better suited for investigated
reality became extremely complex: after all, the key to the
question lies in a scientific area still in the process of develop-
ment.
Surviving this period thus required an acceptance of and a
